ST Confusing State of Galactic Affairs

It's mentioned that the Separatists want to leave the Republic. It's heavily implied if one has been watching TPM that at least part of the reason they are leaving is corporate greed (Trade Federation, Corporate Alliance, Banking Clan -- all references to money and trade) to have the freedom to be relatively unregulated and ungoverned. Sort of like how that operates in real life. Apparently the Trade Federation tried to get away with this in TPM without engaging in a Separatist movement because they thought the Republic would just sit idly by. The Republic did, at first, but when Amidala and the Naboo kicked them out, the Republic didn't really come to back the Trade Federation up. It's a complicated situation (the Naboo politician in AOTC saying that Gunray is still viceroy after many investigations) but overall it seems Sidious is using corruption on both sides to create a quagmire for everyone.

Part of the reason it's not heavily explained too is that both sides are not really that different. They are both controlled by the same master for the same ends. ROTS strikes this note from the start ('There are heroes on both sides.') and it's why Lucas doesn't spend a lot of time on the Clone Wars. It's actually kind of irrelevant because both sides are just being used to create a false flag conflict.

The mystery is the whole point. Corruption, intrigue, and mystery are the main themes of AOTC and the whole thing with Sifo-Dyas is very evocative of that. It's like in real life when you try to investigate some of the origins of corruption in the government or something. Eventually you get to a point where the trail fades out, and it's clear things have been tampered with. Eventually things become so foggy you can't really find out what happened, except that you know something was almost certainly wrong. Somebody covered their tracks hastily. I like that this is directly alluded to when Obi-Wan is looking for Kamino, can't find it, and realizes it's been erased from the archives. Things are getting erased here, trails are leading to dead ends, and something is wrong. We are meant to wonder and feel like something is amiss by the lack of information. So that's on purpose, and it thematically clarifies the messy political situation by its own fogginess, it doesn't distort the theme.

It may not always be a full textbook explanation, but what is there is clear and always thematically in line with the movie in question. I don't feel that this is particularly underlined in TFA very well.

 

I'm pretty sure that explanation got cut when George decided to add in the Factory Sequence. It is in the script.though, as is Padme saying to the Naboo Queen that the Seperatists at that point did not have an army yet, so the Trade Federation et al were not the 'founders' of the CIS. However the fact that they did not make it in to to final cut made things confusing, doubly so when The Clone Wars episode 'Heroes on Both Sides' came up.

Looking back, as confusing as the state of Galactic Affairs is in TFA, it's not as bad as TPM and ATOC. All they had to do was add the word 'Secretly' to the crawl and the majority of ambiguity would be sorted. And also, just like the Biggs Darklighter Scenes, the Leia scenes pre-Takodana scenes would break up the pacing, which is in its own way tragic.

 

I think it's pretty dumb that people are making the same mistakes.. like they didn't learn the last time around that you need to smother any "evil" presence ASAP

 

You know.. I would have much preferred a political exposition sequence to the droid factory and I'm guessing I'm not the only one.. then again I'd rather watch the credits than the droid factory sequence